Tom Mendicino - Probation

I started to relax as the waiter uncorked the second bottle of wine. The evening was going well, better than expected. In fact, it was an unqualified success. The Wilkinses, unlike most of my professional acquaintances, gave every indication they knew how to read. There was plenty to talk about; there was a lot of laughter. Driving home, Alice asked what I’d thought of Nora. The question took me by surprise. I was having a hard time remembering her face.

“She seemed kind of quiet,” I said, assuming shyness was the explanation for her failure to make an impression on me.

“Andy.” Alice laughed. “She talked a blue streak all night!”

Hmmmmm.

“What did you think of Brian?” she asked.

I wondered if that was a trick question.

“Seems like a nice guy,” I said, cautiously.

“You two really seemed to hit it off.”

Did we? I felt a strange sensation in my chest. Good God, I thought, it sounds like an old cliché, but did my heart skip a beat?

“What did you talk about?” she asked.

“I dunno,” I said, suddenly becoming inarticulate.

What did we talk about? Work, obviously. Our wives, certainly. It was easier to remember what we didn’t talk about.

Golf.

Cars.

Power tools.

“Swimming,” I finally said.

“He’s a swimmer too?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“You guys ought to swim together sometime.”

“Yeah, he mentioned something like that,” I said, sounding nonchalant and noncommittal. “He said he’d call to set something up.”

Two days later, she was slipping on her Levi’s while I cradled my foot, engrossed in a virgin blister on my heel. She asked if something was wrong. It must be the new shoes, I said. No, I don’t mean that, she said. I’d thought she was blissfully unaware of my barely concealed agitation, of the nervous twitch I’d developed whenever the phone rang, of my impatient interruptions to ask who was on the line, and of my disappointment when the call was not the one I was so anxiously awaiting.

Wednesday night was close, but no cigar.

“It’s Nora Wilkins,” she said. “She wants to know if we’re free for dinner Saturday night.” She expressed our regrets, telling Nora we were visiting my parents this weekend.

“Wait, wait one minute, Nora. Andy’s trying to tell me something.”

I was waving my hands furiously to get her attention.

“Nora? Andy says they cancelled, that they’re going out of town this weekend. Thanks for telling me, mister,” she said, laughing. “We’d love to.”

I needed to square this little white lie with my mother, pronto, before she called and told Alice they were looking forward to seeing us this weekend and she’d gotten tickets to the garden show for the two of them.

I got a fresh haircut Saturday afternoon and bought a new shirt that brought out the color in my eyes.

“I’ve been meaning to call you all week, Andy, and make a date to go swimming, but the days just got away from me,” he said.

“Oh, I’d forgotten all about it, to tell you the truth,” I lied.

“This week definitely.”

“Not good for me. I’ve got a sales meeting with a distributor in Atlanta.”

“Damn. Soon, then.”

“I’ll be back Wednesday night,” I blurted.

Alice and Nora finished the house tour.

“Andy, you must see it,” Alice said. “The Wilkinses have the most beautiful things.”

If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought Alice had a bit of a crush herself. Nora was so self-assured, a take-charge blonde, slightly butch in a female golf pro sort of way. I made it a point to be more conscious of her, notice her mannerisms, memorize one of her offhand remarks. She was bossy, but in a way that was more brisk and efficient than aggressive, as if she’d already considered and rejected all the alternatives to her way of doing things before you had an opportunity to propose them. She must have reminded Alice of her sisters, which explained why she was so immediately comfortable with her.

“Brian, it’s time to light the grill. Andy, you go with him.”

Aye, aye, sir…er, ma’am.

Central Casting would never have selected Brian Wilkins as the catalyst for my downfall. Hollywood ’s idea of a seducer was everything short, fair, and nearsighted Brian Wilkins was not. That’s not to say Brian wasn’t attractive. Years earlier, he might have been voted Cutest Boy by his high school graduating class. Best Looking would have been a classmate with a more classic profile, better bone structure, and features that would only improve with time, unlike Brian, whose chipmunk cheeks were thickening even before middle age.

A minor inferno erupted when Brian tossed a match on the charcoal. His hand flew up to my chest and he pushed me back from the flame.

“Someday I’ll figure out how much lighter fluid is too much.”

I drank a little too much that night, enough that Alice insisted on taking the wheel to drive home. And the more I drank, the less I’d cared that it was obvious our wives might have been dining in another solar system for all the attention we gave them.

“I told you you’d like them,” Alice said triumphantly as I rolled into bed. “I knew it.”

Brian called the next morning. He was wondering when we might get together for that swim. Too bad this week didn’t look so good. Hey, how about today? This afternoon. It’s clear for me. How about you? We can burn off some of that alcohol. Let’s make it two o’clock. Give me the directions. I’ll find it.

That’s how easy it was. Alice ’s Sunday was committed to yet another shower-either bridal or, more often those days, baby. Her forced cheeriness at the breakfast table meant, yes, definitely, it was another celebration of the imminent arrival of Joshua, if it’s a boy, Sarah, if it’s a girl. She was genuinely delighted for Becca or Susan or Shelley, the glowing mothers-to-be, a happiness untainted by envy. Only once did her armor crack, when her friend Carolyn announced that she and her husband had settled on the name John for their son, after his father’s father. Sure it was old-fashioned, but they were going to call him Jack. We still have lots of time, I consoled her. We can start trying to get pregnant again, as soon as she was ready. Yes, she agreed, soon, sometime soon. Little did we know that a low sperm count would turn out to be a minor obstacle compared to the events set in motion that perfectly ordinary Sunday afternoon.

I hadn’t expected him to be so nervous. He dropped his lock twice, fumbling through the combination. He turned his back to me when he stepped out of his briefs and into his trunks. His shoulders were wide without being impressive. He coughed and bent down to swipe the soles of his bare feet. He finally turned to face me, red in the face and stammering.

“Andy, I’m really sorry about this.”

“Sorry about what?” I asked, truly confused.

“I’m a terrible swimmer. I should have told you up front.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because I wanted to come swimming with you.”

His forwardness made me self-conscious. I knew then why I had impulsively chosen to bring a pair of baggy gym shorts instead of my usual racing trunks. I was conscious of my naked chest and limbs as we walked to the pool. I took long strides, moving quickly, forcing him to keep pace, anxious for the protective cover of warm, chlorinated water. I chose my lane, dove quickly, and swam away.

He wasn’t a bad swimmer; not in my league, but, of course, I was a former state high school champion in the breaststroke, the rare high point in an adolescence distinguished mainly by my ability to achieve new standards of awkwardness. He’d taken the next lane and I passed him many times, coming and going, always averting my eyes and immersing myself in my laps. Half an hour passed. When I pulled myself out of the pool, he was waiting on the deck, his arms wrapped around his knees and his toes inches from my nose. He had huge feet and, before I could censor my thoughts, I wondered if the old wives’ tale was true-big hands, big feet, big everything.